Americans’ Cellphones Targeted in Secret U.S. Spy Program
IMSI-catchers on small US Government planes (Cesna) act as fake cell towers (BTS - base transceiver station) and thus capture civilian’s registration and location info on the ground. These dirtboxes exploit a weakness in the GSM specification which does not require the operator network to show credentials i.e. identify itself as legitimate.
Cellphones are programmed to connect automatically to the strongest base station signal. The devices they use identifies themselves as having the closest, strongest signal, even though they do not, and force all the phones that can detect its signal to send in their unique registration information. Having encryption on a phone doesn’t prevent this process.
The technology is aimed at locating cellphones linked to individuals under investigation by the government, including fugitives and drug dealers, but it collects information on cellphones belonging to people who aren’t criminal suspects, these people said. They said the device determines which phones belong to suspects and “lets go” of the non-suspect phones.
[...]
The program cuts out phone companies as an intermediary in searching for suspects. Rather than asking a company for cell-tower information to help locate a suspect, which law enforcement has criticized as slow and inaccurate, the government can now get that information itself.
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Within the Marshals Service, some have questioned the legality of such operations and the internal safeguards, these people said. They say scooping up of large volumes of information, even for a short period, may not be properly understood by judges who approve requests for the government to locate a suspect’s phone.
▻http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/americans-cellphones-targeted-in-secret-u-s-spy-program-1415917533-lMyQj
#imsi-catcher : ▻http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMSI-catcher
#dirtbox : DRT : ▻http://electrospaces.blogspot.com/2013/11/drtbox-and-drt-surveillance-systems.html
#BTS : ▻http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_transceiver_station
#MITM
#surveillance